Abstract
- WhatsApp is developing its media sharing preview feature, improving the experience by providing more clarity.
- The new preview feature is still in beta, but will provide a thumbnail when media is shared as files.
- This is currently running in beta, but should be available to regular users soon.
WhatsApp is constantly evolving, making it one of the best secure messaging apps in 2024. Not only do you get encrypted chat, but you can also use the app for phone and video calls. Sometimes, as more features are added, there is a tendency to forget about feature improvements that were introduced earlier. Thankfully, that doesn’t seem to be the case here, as WhatsApp is now working on improving its media sharing feature, which will now show previews for media attached as files, to make things clearer for users.
8 Best Encrypted Messaging Apps
Protect your conversations from prying eyes
The new update was spotted by the folks at WABetaInfo, while checking out the latest Android beta update which comes as version 2.24.9.8. While not the most exciting update, a small change will go a long way, bringing better clarity for users as they chat and share many different types of files. The new preview feature will look just like the old one, giving users a preview of what to expect. While we’ve seen this before with images and web pages, it will now apply to media shared as files.
A small change that will change the world
So you might be wondering why someone would send media as a file instead of just adding it to the chat as usual? Well, there are several reasons, but the most important one would be quality. Although WhatsApp has added a way to send higher resolution images to people, they are still compressed, meaning that if you want to send someone the full resolution, you have to send the media as a file for that to happen.
Usually, when these types of files are sent now, they only have a filename and that’s pretty much it. If you’re the recipient, you really have no idea what to expect unless the sender tells you, and even then, you’d probably be calmer if you had a preview. In the image above you can see an example of current vs. update where the top is just the filename and the bottom is a preview of the image being sent.
That’s what this new change aims to fix, and for now it will only be available to those in the WhatsApp beta. Of course, this will be a welcome change when it hits the public, but if you want an early look, you’ll need to get into the Android beta using the Google Play Store. And if you’ve never tried the app, it might be worth a look because it offers so much and makes it easy to communicate with friends, family and colleagues around the world.